Tuesday, 8 April 2014

Training log: 10.03 - 06.04 - High mileage and Hout Bay

From the top of Ou Kaapse Weg

It has been
4 weeks since my last post which shows that I have been pretty busy. Thankfully
not all of the busyness has been work and I have had some time to get in some
decent mileage. These last 6 weeks before 2 Oceans was always going to be
crucial and I feel I got decent mileage in 3 out of the 4 weeks which is not a
bad average. The 4th week I basically started the taper but included
some good trail running which definitely helps the strength.

Week 1:
10.03 – 16.03

Monday –
CrossFit

The second
workout of the open and this one did not suit me at all. Bearing in mind I can barely
overhead squat a PVC pipe, the amrap of OHS and chest to bar pull-ups was never
going to be fun. In the allotted time, I only managed 4 overhead squats at
44kg so didn’t even get to the pull-ups. It was 4 more than I thought I would
get however, and this is what the Open is about, pushing yourself to uncomfortable levels...lovely.

Tuesday – Interval session at ATC

Some good sprints. A set of 20 of about 70 metres at 85% pace (whatever, we ran it at 100)

Wednesday –
Run - Birthday Tempo

I really
wanted to start a tradition of running my age on my birthday but I was a bit
stuck for time this year. So I sneaked out for a quick tempo run to make sure I
was firing for the upcoming Weskus Marathon. I managed to average under 5min
per km so signs are solid.

The third
open workout and it was something that played more to my strengths. My strategy
was similar to my ill-advised running strategy of going as hard as you can for
as long as you can and I was quite happy with the result. I got through the
box-jumps pretty quickly which gave me time to struggle through the deadlifts
to a total of 92 reps.

I am loving
this morning run more and more and running on a fullish moon made for a
splendidly magical start to the day.

16.4km

1:27:00
(estimated – Strava not working properly)

Wednesday and Thursday – Rest – also attended the Trails in
Motion film festival (trailsinmotion.com) which is a great initiative and the
short documentaries really fired up my motivation for the upcoming offroad
season.

Friday – Run – Trail to C-Nek

I had not
been able to do the mileage thus far for the week that I had planned so my goal
was to do 3 half marathon distances in 3 days to catch up. In the end I only
managed 2 as I had to work the Sunday. The first was a part road and part trail
up the Hout Bay pipetrack to Constantia Nek and back down. Every day I realize how
happy I am that we have made the move to Hout Bay, it is a running mecca where
although you always have to climb to get out of the valley, every route out is
beautiful.

19.1km

1:53:34

5:58/km

Saturday – Run – Road Chappies

Apollo was
out and blessed us with a peach of a day to enjoy a run to Noordhoek and back. My
intention was to run Chappies at a decent pace to try tire my legs and then see
if I can push the pace coming down the hill on the way back. I have identified
this as the place where things fell apart in last year’s 2 Oceans so I was
interested to see how quickly I could do it in order to determine pacing
strategies for this year. I managed a few sub 5 kilometers which was
encouraging so I think the strategy is to smash 2 Race Foods at the top and
then pound all the way down, we just have to hope there isn’t another headwind
this year.

Running hard on Chappies

20.1km

1:46:53

5:19/km

Sunday – work/rest

Week total

55.6km

5:07:27

Week 3:
24.03 – 31.03

Monday – Rest – After realizing I would get nowhere in this
week’s open workout and having too much other stuff on my plate, I decided to
retire from the 2014 CrossFit Games.

Tuesday – Run – Trail – C-Nek

Dusted off
the Inov-8s and hit the trails to explore a bit around Constantia Nek. I need
to get to know these trails better now while it is still light.

7.1km

42:35

6:02/km

Wednesday – Rest

Thursday – Run – Run around Camps bay

From TAGG
up Bizkop (those steps are tougher than I remember), up Kloofnek, down Camps
Bay Drive, back through Clifton, up Bizkop again and back to TAGG.

14.5km

1:12:46

5:01/km

I was also lucky
enough to be invited to attend a Garmin partner event in the evening (more news on how I got the invite coming up).
It was great to see some new products they are launching this year. I really
like the look of their new range of GoPro type cameras which track all sorts of
fun features and incorporate it into your film such as speed, maps, heart rate
etc. Definitely a luxury purchase but it looks like so much fun that you may be
able to justify it.

Friday – Rest before my annual big event

Saturday – Run – Flight of the Falcon

Running selfie mid Falcon

Last year I
started an annual tradition of running this same portion of the 2 Oceans route
about a month before the big day. This is also around the time of my birthday
so I think it is a great way to self-celebrate. The route starts in Hout Bay,
heads up Constantia Nek in the dark whilst still fresh, down Constantia Main
Road, along Spaanschemat River Road, up and over Ou Kaapse Weg, down through
Noordhoek and then up and over Chappies and back home. This is supposed to be a
nice slow run with plenty of time taken to enjoy the scenery up all 3 of the
big hills. Traditional stopping points are at the top of Ou Kaapse Weg for
breakfast, at the start of Chappies for a snack with the view of Long Beach and
then anywhere else you need to make it back.

42.5km

4:37:53

6:33/km

View for snack time

Sunday - Rest

Week total

64.1km

6:33:14

Week 4:
31.03 – 06.04

A slower
week (I might have started tapering a bit too aggressively). My brother Big
Dogg is down with the family from Canada so it has been great showing him a few
of my local routes.

Tuesday – Run – C-Nek

The same
C-Nek route as last week. It is a nice quickish loop with an ideal amount of
climbing included.

7.0km

0:44:49

Saturday – Race – Lourensford Traverse

My second
new race of the year and the second time I have been surprised by how awesome
such an unknown event is. This race is barely even noticed on the race calendar
but it should be one that people flock to. A full race report to follow.